MOSCOW SEVERS RELATIONS

Southland Times, Issue 23988, 1 December 1939, Page 7

MOSCOW SEVERS RELATIONS

FINLAND STRONGLY CRITICIZED (United Press Assn.—Telegraph Copyright) LONDON, November 29. The Soviet Prime Minister, M. Viacheslav Molotov, announced over the Moscow radio that Russia had broken off relations with Finland and had recalled her Ambassador. The Moscow correspondent of the Associated Press of Great Britain says that the withdrawal of the Finnish border troops heightened hopes of a peaceful settlement, despite the continued violence of the Russian propaganda campaign. M. MOLOTOV’S BROADCAST Finland’s reply to the Russian Note had not reached the Foreign Office when the Vice-Commissar for Foreign Affairs, M. Vladimar Potemkin, summoned the Finnish Ambassador and informed him that diplomatic relations had been broken off. Immediately afterwards M. Molotov broadcast a speech in which he said:— “The hostile policy of the present Finnish Government compels us to take immediate steps to safeguard the external security of our State. The Red Army and Navy must be prepared for all eventualities. The Soviet patiently negotiated certain proposals which offered a minimum guarantee for the safety of our country, particularly Leningrad, in view of the international tension, but Finland adopted an irreconcilable attitude and acted in" the interests of foreign imperialists and warmongers. Despite all our concessions the negotiations proved to be without result. There has been abominable provocation by the Finnish military on the frontier. Our soldiers have been heavily shelled by artillery near Leningrad and have suffered heavy casualties. Efforts to prevent a repetition of the provocations have met with no response and have even evoked a hostile attitude on the part of the Finnish official circles.” , M. Molotov denounced the Finnish Government and declared that the dispute must be settled by the Soviet with the friendly co-operation of the Finnish people. “The Soviet can no longer tolerate the present situation for which the Finnish Government is fully responsible,” said M. Molotov. “The recall of our diplomatic representatives and the readiness of our armed forces is not an attempt to violate Finnish independence and annex territory. We have no such intention. If the Finnish attitude had been friendly, the Soviet would have made territorial concessions and favourably considered the reunion of the Karelians with the Finns in a united and independent Finnish nation. We regard Finland as an independent sovereign State, whatever her regime, but the solution of urgent problems

could not be conditional on the bad faith of the present Finnish leaders. The Soviet must solve the matter in friendly co-operation with the Finnish people, safeguarding Leningrad. This is the only way to reopen friendly Soviet-Finnish relations.

The Moscow correspondent of The New York Times, G. E. R. Gedye, states that among foreigners it is generally felt that the Kremlin’s handling of the Finnish question was clumsy, compared with the tact and adroitness connected with the dealings with Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania, which agreed to the terms, and Turkey, which did rot. It has been frequently remarked that the Soviet might have expected more understanding of its attitude if it had said, when it became clear that the Finns were unwilling to accept the minimum terms, that world events obliged the Soviet to insist that the policy of collective security they had long vainly advocated had become a dead letter and that with the world ablaze they must take exceptional measures to protect their frontiers. It is argued that Russia should have offered generous treatment if Finland had agreed, especially in matters of trade, but if she refused the Soviet, in the interest of security, would have been obliged to treat the refusal as a hostile act. Though this might have been criticized as over-riding the formal independence of a small neighbour, many felt that it would have created a better impression than the methods actually used, namely, alleging frontier incidents without offering an opportunity for impartial investigation, insisting oh the correctness of its own versions and brushing aside explanations and disavowals while maintaining a campaign of vituperation in the Press, attributing incredible dreams of conquest to the Finns and organizing inflammatorymeetings of Russian workers, which were certain to meet with an unsympathetic reception by the outside world generally.